With recent developments in weapons technology combined with an evolving face of global terrorism, there has been an increase in the threat posed to military forces in combat, rescue and humanitarian missions. In particular, shooters such as terrorist militiamen are using inexpensive, portable and readily available weapons such as sniper rifles, assault rifles and shoulder-fired missiles against ground vehicles such as High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles (humvees) or even aircraft, such as helicopters and airplanes. For aircrafts, there is particular danger when the aircraft is flying low during flight, landing and takeoff As used herein, a “shooter” refers to an enemy firing a weapon at military personnel, while a “gunner” refers to military personnel firing a weapon at a shooter.
Systems exist for determining the location of a shooter from a vehicle or an aircraft. Illustrative systems include sensors that record acoustic shockwave signals generated by an incoming projectile. Illustrative examples of ground vehicle mounted or stand-alone shooter detection systems are described in commonly-owned U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,710,828 and 7,126,877 and PCT Publication Number WO2006/096208, the contents of each of which are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety. Illustrative examples of airborne shooter detection systems are disclosed in commonly-owned U.S. patent application Ser. Nos. 12/220,745 and 12/629,761 and PCT Publication Number WO 2010/030433, the contents of each of which are incorporated herein in their entirety.
Each of the abovementioned systems and methods detect incoming projectiles, detect or determine the shooter's location, and provide aural and/or visual warnings to military personnel. For instance, such warnings may be an audio announcement of the form “Incoming shot at X o'clock and Y meters”, where X and Y are determined by the shooter detection system, or may be a visual indication such as an illuminated pointer in a gunner's helmet display or a pilot's heads-up display. The military personnel, such as a gunner on an aircraft, need to manually move their weapon in response to these warnings. In some cases, particularly in situations in which the ground vehicle or aircraft is trying to penetrate enemy territory undetected, illuminated pointers can be seen by attacking militiamen, and may even inadvertently provide the ground vehicle's or aircraft's location to these attacking militiamen. In addition, because the gunners need to accurately move their weapons to point them at the detected shooter location, there may be inaccuracies in positioning the weapon and in turn, in the return fire from the gunner's weapon to the shooter.
Accordingly, there is a need for a system and method that assists gunners in aiming their weapons towards detected shooters in an accurate, quick, and non-disruptive manner.